Woven fabric



Jan. 11, 1938. B JACKSON 2,105,190

WOVEN FABRIC Filed July 29. 1935 INVENTOR Ho NA RD E. k/flC/(SON.

ATTORNEY Patented Jan. 11, 1938 PATENT OFFICE WOVEN FABRIC Howard B.Jackson, Kings Mountain, N. 0., as-

signor to Neisler Mills, Inc., Kings Mountain,

Application July 29',

1 Claim.

The present invention relates to a woven fabric, and. more particularly,to a woven fabric intended for use as coverings for upholsteredfurniture.

One object of the invention is to provide a woven fabric of novelappearance having a ribbed face or right side and a smooth back or wrongside.

Another object of the invention is to provide a woven fabric having aribbed surface of variegated appearance.

Another object of the invention is generally to produce at low cost astrong woven fabric provided with a ribbed surface of pleasingappearance.

The above objects of the invention and other objects ancillary theretowill best be understood from the following description considered withreference to the accompanying drawing.

In the drawing: 1

Fig. l is a face view on an enlarged scale of a swatch of fabric of thepresent invention;

Fig. 2 is a more orless' diagrammatic face view of thefpresent fabric,showing threads displaced from their normal position, for thesake ofclearness in illustration of the weave of the fabric;

Fig. 3 is a sectional view on the line 3-3 of' Fig. 1;

Fig. 4 is a fragmentary enlarged view of a ribforming thread, with partsof the yarn strands shown untwisted,'for illustration purposes.

Briefly described, the fabric of the present invention, in one preferredembodiment, comprises a foundation, consisting of fine warp threadsdisposed in close side-by-side relation and of relatively widely spacedfine weft threads, and ribforming coarse weft threads of variegatedappearance projecting from a surface of said foundation and held thereonby a relatively small number of widely spaced fine warp threads of saidfoundation. The coarse weft threads are disposed in pairs arranged incloseside-by-side relation, each pair forming a single rib. The ribsthus formed are disposed in relatively closely spaced relation, thespace between adjacent ribs being substantially equal to the width ofone rib. Each coarse weft thread is constituted by a pair of twistedstrands of differently colored pre-dyed yarn twisted together with asimilar pair of twisted strands whereby each of said weft threads has avariegated appearance and when woven with the foundation threads to formthe ribbed fabric, imparts to the latter a variegated appearance. Thefabric may be made of any suitable material, such as, cotton, natural1935, Serial No. 33,638

or artificial silk, wool, or combinations of such materials. I

Referring to the drawing in detail, and first to Fig. 1 the presentfabric comprises'a foundation I8, consisting of fine warp threads I2disposed in close side-by-side relation and of fine weft threads I4, andhas a ribbed surface pro vided by ribs I6. Each of said ribs isconstituted by two coarse weft threads I8, I 8 disposed in closeside-by-side relation, the ribs I6 being spaced from each other by anamount substantially equal to the width of a rib or of two of the ribforming weft threads I8.

The rib-forming weft threads I8 are secured to the foundation ID in suchmanner as to project maximally beyond the surface of said foundation.For this purpose, said threads are secured to the foundation III by arelatively small number of widely spaced warp threads I2, thearrangement being such that the particular warp threads which engage oneof a pair of rib-forming threads I8 do not engage the other thread ofsaid rib, but float under the latter and under severalother pairs ofrib-forming threads before engaging another of a pair of such threads.Thus, for example, referring to Fig. 2, it will be observed that a warpthread I2 engages one of the weft threads I8 at the point a, then floatsunder the companion thread I8 and under four pairs of ribbed threads,after which it engages at b a rib thread I8. The rib-forming thread I8,which is the companion of the thread engaged at a, is secured at c by afoundation warp thread I2, which is relatively widely spaced from thewarp thread I2 which engages the other thread I8 of said pair and, likethe latter, the warp thread I2 which engages the thread I8 at c thenfloats under four pairs of threads I8 and under the thread I8 which isengaged at b, and then engages at d the companion'thread I8 of thethread engaged at b. In like manner the other pairs of rib-formingthreads are engaged by different warp threads at relatively widelyspaced points whereby the weft threads I8, while securely held to thefoundation, project maximally beyond the surface of the latter. It willbe noticed that thefine weft threads I4 of the foundation layer arearranged in pairs so that there is a weft thread I4 disposed close toeach weft'thread I8 of a rib I6. As best shown in Fig. 3, the weftthreads I4 are interwoven with each of the warp threads I2 and thusconstitute binder threads and cause the warp threads I2, which engagethe several weft-threads I8, to engage the latter throughout substantialportions of their peripheral surfaces.

An important feature of the present invention resides in providing theribbed surface of the present fabric with a variegated appearance, whichis produced simultaneously vwth the weaving of the fabric and withoutsubsequent dyeing or printing processes. This is accomplished byutilizing a special weft thread which is constructed to have in itself,a variegated appearance, so as to obtain the desired effect when aplurality of such weft threads are Woven into the fabric' in producingthe ribbed surface thereof. AQCOXd'. ingly, in accordance with thepresent invention,

each coarse weft or rib-forming thread It comprises a pair of threadsI82: formed by twisting together a pair of differently colored strands18y, and I82, respectively, the threads l8a: being twisted together toform the thread It]. The

strands I811 and I82 may differ in color or may differ with respect tothe shades of the same color, and for the purpose of convenience indescription, the term differently colored as used herein, refers eitherto different colors or to different shades of the same color. Thus, forexample, a fabric of particularly pleasing appearance was produced inaccordance with the present invention by weaving the foundation;including the fine warp and fine weft threads, of green threads of thesame shade and in utilizing in conjunction therewith'rib-forming weftthreads I 8 in which one of the yarn strands I831 was of the same coloras that of the foundation threads, and the other yarn strand I82 was ofa lighter shade of the same color. The fabric thus produced was found tohave a pleasing variegated appearance, and by thus introducing into therib-forming-threads a yarn strand of a lighter shade it was found thatthe ribs appear to project further from the surface of the: foundationthereby accentuating the ribbed surface. It was also found, by arrangingthe weft threads I8 in pairs that in addition to increasing the width ofeach rib the variegated appearance thereof was-enhanced by reason ofthe. displacement in companion weft threads of the differently coloredportions thereof. so'that a portion of lighter color of one rib-formingthread did not coincide, except occasionally by chance, with a similarportion of the companion rib-forming thread. Other fabrics madeinaccordance with the present invention were provided-with surface designsintroduced during the weaving of the fabric by'jacquard apparatus,porclearly illustrating the weave of the fabric.

tions of the ribs being dropped into the foundation for that purpose.

In Fig. 1 of the drawing, the fabric has been represented on an enlargedscale in the approximate ratio of 3 to 1, and in Fig. 4 of the drawing,the weft thread l8 has been represented on the enlarged scaleapproximately in the ratio of 6 to 1. Fig. 2 is drawn to about thesamescale as Fig. 1, except that the threads have been displaced fromeach other for the purpose of more It will be understood, therefore,that in the actual fabric 'the threads are finer than as illustrated andthat the ribs it are more closely spaced than as shown by 'Fig. 1. Also,in the finished fabric the warp threads which engage the rib-formingthreads are substantially invisible and the foundatiornas a whole, isvirtually concealed, although readily seen upon close inspection.

Thus, it is seen that the fabric herein disclosed, is well adapted toaccomplish the several objects of the invention, but it will beunderstood that while I have disclosed the preferred embodiment of theinvention, certain changes whichmay. oc-

cur to those skilled in the art in view of the w present disclosure, maybe made therein. There fore, I do not wish to be limited to the precisefabric construction herein shown and described, except as may berequired by the appended claim considered with reference to the priorart.

What is claimed as new and useful is:

A woven ribbed fabric. comprising a ground of fine warp threads disposedin close side by side relation, ribs formed by pairs of relativelycoarse weft threads which are held on one surface of said ground by afew widely spaced warp threads and projecting substantially maximallyfrom said surface, the threads of each pair being disposed in contiguousrelation, said pairs of weft threads being disposed in spaced relationon-said ground whereby the latter is exposed to view between successivepairs of said weft threads, a fine weft thread lying close to a coarseweft thread of each pair, each-of said coarse weft threads comprising apair of twisted strands-of differently colored pre-dyed yarn twistedtogether with a similar pair of twisted strands whereby the ribs have avariegated appearance, said exposed portions of the ground betweensuccessive ribs being composed substantially exclusively of said closelyar ranged fine warp threads.

HOWARD B. JACKSON-.

